Question re: NBME Surgery Exam

If you have the time (which of course no one really ever has on their surgery rotation) Lawrence Principles of General Surgery is money. It is a basic clerkship level text that covers just about everything on the shelf really well. I had friends that liked NMS but it isn't really any faster than reading Lawrence. If you need a fast review High-yield surgery isn't bad, and neither is Blueprints.

hate textbooks and lawrence qualifies as one
nms too big
read surgical recall and Bards/wards surg section and did questions from A&L
that was manageable
hope you know medicine

Go with Lawrence. Do all the questions at the end of every chapter.

I read surgical recall cover to cover and did all of appleton & lange and managed to score in the mid 80s on the surgery shelf. of course, this was my last 3rd year rotation so i already knew medicine.

Well, it depends on how much time you have...

If you have a lot of time on your hands, use Lawrence.

If you only have a little, then use High-Yield.

However, I think Recall is pretty useless in any scenario.

However, I think Recall is pretty useless in any scenario.

Click to expand...

I disagree... I think reading a text, especially Lawrence, is great and you should definitely do that. But Recall encapsulates important nuggets of information that are very commonly tested and pimped, and you should DEFINITELY read through it at least once as you study.

MadC

<i>Recall</i> is useful for the Wards---pimping, looking up information quickly, etc.

But its choppy, question-and-answer style do not make it very conducive to long reading sessions.

I did NMS and a little bit of Recall. NMS was pretty dense but tolerable. I also paged through a huge book of questions (i have blocked out that time in my life so I don't remember which one) which was not helpful. It was so much easier than the exam. my only advice is if you are not a fast test taker, stay aware of the time. I am a fast test taker and took almost the entire time. I know a few friends that had to mark random answers for the last 20-30 questions--not good. I also remember that the last few questions seemed to have the most answers. All in all, dont' freak out, I thought I failed it and I did pretty well.

Honestly, much of the Surgery NBME test was more like Emergency Medicine- patient is shot, stabbed, in a MVA, etc. and you need to stabilize the patient prior to the actual surgery. There really aren't that many questions pertaining to anatomy, surgical techniques, etc. It really is a modified Medicine over "surgical" topics. I would concentrate on surgically correctable HTN, stabilization of a acutely injured patient, the acute abdomen, and trauma.

Yes, the last 25 or so questions have >5 answer possiblities... I usually start with these to get them out of the way!!!